Going Gagá Volviéndonos Gagá

Going Gagá

Two Indiegogo campaigns organized by Northern Manhattan groups are currently raising funds for projects. One is devoted to music and spirituality—the other to music and spirits.

Gagá musicians travel from town to town, crossing the Dominican Republic from one end to the other.

When people talk about Gagá in Washington Heights, the chances are good that they’re not talking about a pop singer performing in a meat dress.

There are Gagá performances during Sunday summer afternoons at Anne E. Loftus Playground in Fort Tryon Park. But some of the best performances are in the Dominican Republic during Holy Week.

Genaro Ozuna is the organizer of the uptown performances. He’s also the mayor of El Gagá la Ceja, located in the La Romana district of the Dominican Republic. He said Gagá music and ceremonies are important for many reasons.

“The primary reason is it connects ourselves with our ancestors,” he said. “It keeps us close to the divine, to our past and to make a way in the present to a better future.”

Preserving music and ceremony are important. That’s why TINGO: Grita Fuerte, a small Washington Heights-based organization is raising $15,000 to buy a bus for La Ceja.

“This is how people have survived years and years of oppression,” says Isolina de la Cruz of TINGO: Grita Fuerte.

Every year during Holy Week, musicians from La Ceja and other bateyes, as small towns organized around work in the sugar industry are called, play music, often traveling from town to town, crossing the Dominican Republic from one end to the other.

Nathalie Tejada, co-founder of TINGO: Grita Fuerte, said that Gagá (called Rará in Haiti) is a celebration where the entire community comes together.

“It’s a part of our history, it’s part of our culture, it’s part of our daily life,” she added. “It’s beyond a celebration.”

Ozuna said that nearly everyone in takes part in the celebrations. His family members are all singers, dancers, musicians and instrument makers. He started participating at age seven by helping make costumes.

While the biggest celebrations are during Holy Week, it is not necessarily a reflection of Christianity.

The celebrations are linked to an idea of the resurrection of life and light that happens during each spring.

“It’s beyond a celebration,” notes Nathalie Tejada.

“We do not call it a religion,” said Ozuna. “It’s spiritualism.”

It’s a belief that everything on earth is alive and has a spirit. “Everything that you see, everything that you touch is divine,” said Ozuna. “Everything is created for one divinity.”

Isolina de la Cruz, also of TINGO: Grita Fuerte, said that communities have long held these beliefs dear. “This is how people have survived years and years of oppression,” she said. “Through their religious beliefs, through their spirituality and through the music.”

“Gagá represents reclaiming the history that has been denied to me forever,” she said. “It’s the way we connect to a higher power—or higher powers—the way we connect to the earth. It’s the way our people survived.”

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